A local man has died and a woman is in serious condition after they were stabbed repeatedly by a stranger who confronted them Friday night as they were walking in Pioneer Square after the Seattle Sounders game, police said.

Friends identified the man who died as Troy Wolff, 46, who was chairman of the English Department at Shoreline Community College and had taught there for 17 years.

He was walking with his girlfriend near 3rd Avenue South and South Jackson Street at about 10:30 p.m. Friday when she was suddenly confronted by a man who pulled out a small knife and began stabbing her repeatedly in the torso.

Wolff attempted to intervene, and the suspect turned on him and began stabbing him repeatedly in the neck and torso, Seattle police spokesman Jeff Kappel said. Wolff died hours later at the hospital.

Officers from the Seattle Police Department's SWAT and gang units arrived on scene first and found the suspect standing near the victims still holding the bloody knife. The suspect dropped the knife when police arrived and was taken into custody.

Another in a long string of murders committed by untreated mentally ill people. This is the result of reduced mental health spending and programs, and civil rights laws that prevent law enforcement from institutionalizing known dangerous mentally ill people.

Republicans will continue to argue that we should not have to pay to treat these people, and we will continue to pay with random innocent lives.